The proposed contracts are on the agenda for Monday, August 14, after the vote was delayed by a week. Councilman Rafael Espinoza requested the delay and sent a letter to Mayor Michael Hancock Friday morning asking him to deny the contracts.

“It doesn’t make any sense to contract with someone for tree removal when the question of is this an appropriate use of park land remains,” said Espinoza.

“I think it’s wrong that they need to stop, they need to wait and they need to continue to listen. Whether that’s going to happen or not I don’t know, but that’s what I think is the right thing to do,” said Nancy Francis, a Denver resident.

An email addressed to council members and obtained by Denver7 said the project is on a “very tight schedule.” It goes on to list the number of trees being removed as well as the size of the trees being removed. The email states 263 trees will be removed from the course as part of the project.

“We are concerned that the city will go ahead and begin to remove trees and we don’t want to see that happen,” said Francis.

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The City and County of Denver and Saunders Construction are hosting a community open house to share updates on the redesign of City Park Golf Course. There will be stations with information on the following aspects[...]

Councilman Rafael Espinoza has been vocal about his concerns about the project.
“This is a colossal misuse of hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer’s money that could be addressing a whole bunch of stormwater needs citywide,” Espinoza said in an interview. “While I think there is a nice and beautiful and more playable way of doing what we’re doing today, yes, I don’t object to the concept.”
That is, using the golf course for detention might be OK — just not like this.
“I do object to the way we’re using city funds and creating projects that aren’t necessary and building projects that aren’t necessary for this city, but are necessary for the interstate and confusing the two,” Espinoza said.
There are also questions as to whether the City Park Golf Course renovations will even see the light of day with multiple lawsuits against the project. Espinoza questioned how much the design process is costing the city for a project that could be halted by the court. Read more →

What does it say about our city and the value of its commitments when in one breath our mayor can pledge long term stewardship of the Denver Press Club building and in the next sacrifice City Park Golf Course to redevelopment for drainage? City Park Friends and Neighbors believe Denver can do better and we urge the Hancock Administration to meet the commitment it made to preserve and protect City Park Golf Course. Read more →